Dr Rosemary Golding

Professional biography

Rosemary’s research covers areas of institutional and cultural history of music in nineteenth-century Britain. She is interested in musical identities, and particularly in the history of the music profession. More recently she has written about organists and organ recitals, professional organisation and accreditation in the 1890s, and music in lunatic asylums. 

Her most recent publication is a large-scale documentary history of music in nineteenth-century Britain. Commissioned by Routledge, the four volumes cover a range of topics charting the ways in which music was discussed and described in nineteenth-century print, from autobiographies to examinations of musical listening, from descriptions of concerts to philosophical texts. The volumes draw on her wide-ranging interests across the music and musical practices of nineteenth-century Britain, and offered a valuable opportunity to bring much of this research together. Details of the publication are available here: Music in Nineteenth-Century Britain - 1st Edition - Rosemary Golding (routledge.com)

Rosemary's current research draws on her long-standing interests in the relationship between music and health, and in the historical perceptions of music's health-giving properties. This intersects with her work on the identities and discourse surrounding music in nineteenth-century Britain. Her current project is focussed around music in British asylums during the nineteenth century and she has published a monograph on this subject, drawing on a rich body of archive material: https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-78525-3. Her research blog is available here: https://musichealthandhappiness.wordpress.com/

Some other recent research has been published in a blog post here: http://fass.open.ac.uk/school-arts-humanities-music/news/music-moral-management-and-mental-health-what-can-we-learn

In 2013 her first monograph, Music and Academia in Victorian Britain, was published by Ashgate. This book traces the development of music as a university subject at four British universities during the nineteenth century: Oxford, Cambridge, Edinburgh and London. See https://www.routledge.com/Music-and-Academia-in-Victorian-Britain/Golding/p/book/9781138276659 This was followed by an edited collection of essays on the Music Profession in Britain 1780-1920. Details of the book and its contents can be found here: https://www.routledge.com/The-Music-Profession-in-Britain-1780-1920-New-Perspectives-on-Status/Golding/p/book/9781138291867

Rosemary is keen to hear from potential PhD students interested in any area of music in nineteenth-century Britain, in the social and institutional history of music, in the history of music and health, and in music education.

Selected Publications

For a full list please see the publications tab

Rosemary has contributed to modules across the Arts and Music curriculum, working on module teams including AA100, A224, AA302, A870, A871 and A877. She chaired the Music MA modules A870 and A871 between September 2011 and November 2014 and the second-level module A224 between August 2017 and February 2018. She wrote two online units on research skills for the Music Level 3 module A342 and a case study for MA Music module A873. Rosemary is currently chairing production of a new Music MA module, A890.

As Staff Tutor she manages tuition on a range of modules across the Arts disciplines, currently A111 and Music MA (A873, A874). She worked as an Associate Lecturer on the introductory interdisciplinary module AA100, and the third-level music module AA302.

Rosemary supervises a number of PhD students, including topics in music and its social history in nineteenth-century Britain.

As Associate Dean for Learning and Teaching in Arts (2014-15) Rosemary had responsibilities across the faculty's curriculum, including developing new module content, teaching and assessment policy, employability and accessibility.